Communication-free Cohesive Flexible-Object Transport using Decentralized Robot Networks

Decentralized network theories focus on achieving consensus and in speeding up the rate of convergence to consensus. However, network cohesion (i.e., maintaining consensus) during transitions between consensus values is also important when transporting flexible structures. Deviations in the robot positions due to loss of cohesion when moving flexible structures from one position to another, such as uncured-composite aircraft wings, can cause large deformations, which in turn, can result in potential damage. The major contribution of this work is to develop a decentralized approach to transport flexible objects in a cohesive manner using local force measurements, without the need for additional communication between the robots. Additionally, stability conditions are developed for discrete-time implementation of the proposed cohesive-transition approach, and experimental results are presented, which show that the proposed cohesive transportation approach can reduce the relative deformations by 85% when compared to the case without it.